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A Farewell to Summer from Galveston Beach
Shark eye, Neverita duplicata Cancellate Cantharus, Solenosteira cancellaria Lettered Olive, Oliva sayana Atlantic Ghost Crab, Ocypode quadrata The good (and bad) things about having a kid in school is that there are now random holidays in the middle of the month that adults don’t typically get—teacher work days for one. Forest had one of these on Monday and rather than splitting the day and each of us working from home part of it, we took the day off and went to the beach. We had several things going for us: late September, it being a Monday, and not a normal holiday. I was hoping it wouldn’t be very crowded and…
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Bubbles on the Front Porch
Forest turned 7 a few weeks ago. Another year with this kiddo and I can’t believe he’s been hanging out with us for seven years now. The baby years seem so distant and yet when I conjure up the memories they are right there—the fluffy cloth diapers, the crawling toddler, the endless hours I spent sustaining the life of that kid with my body…oh boy! And now he’s 7 and in love with Minecraft, YouTube gamers who play Minecraft, and dragons. And cats. Oh, and hamsters. He’s been less interested in outdoor activities and even going to the studio in the last few months so I think we’re in a…
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A New Find
Earlier this summer I decided I wanted to get back into using a FitBit. After finding a very basic and cheap model for $20 on NextDoor, I was set up to start walking challenges with friends again. I’ve had a Garmin watch for several years now and actually love it, but there are less folks I know in real life using it as their preferred fitness watch. I ended up having to switch to a better FitBit later on that I found, also for a steal, because the cheap, basic version was cheap and basic and fell apart. Suffice to say, I lept back into walking challenges this summer and…
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August 2021 Rewind
The first of August and the end of August seem like entirely different years. I came home from my weekend away from friends and peered out the window in the stairwell and thought the garden was looking lovely. That tropical cactus makes me so happy when I see it and it is growing like crazy right now. Rusty is becoming *my* cat in many ways. He’s also a bit of a jerk, albeit a cute jerk. He loves to cuddle while I watch tv and will sleep up next to me in bed only after he’s been very demanding about getting pets on his head. He loves his scritches but…
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Grabbing Hold of The Feeling
We had stayed up beyond midnight the night before, talking and catching up despite that it was well passed our middle aged bedtimes. Bleary-eyed I woke up on Saturday morning as the sun broke through the curtain in the loft upstairs. I rolled over a couple of times, got on my phone to distract myself, and then finally convinced myself that I should get out of bed and do the thing I wanted to do, which was explore the pastures on the property of the AirBnB we were staying at. Downstairs, Michelle and Stephanie were already awake. Steph had made coffee and the two of them were talking quietly while…
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Mid-Summer Nature Tidbits | Neighborhood Nature
Summer is slipping away and I feel like I have had my head down and haven’t been enjoying nature the last couple of weeks. Everything is happening in a blur. But the monarchs are here again, not that they totally left this summer, but we’ve had more hanging around this last week than I’ve seen since spring. And they’ve been leaving evidence of their progeny all over the place. I get a kick out of watching them methodically chow down on a milkweed leaf! I have not been able to identify this caterpillar yet. I found it on the path leading to our office and moved it over to a…
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July 2021 Rewind
It’s feels like the first of July was in one year and the end of it was in another. What a long month it was! Apparently at the first of the month I was hanging out with a toad friend from the yard. Thank goodness for photos because I had completely forgotten about this happening! Before Chris and I left for San Antonio the weekend of the 4th I noticed that the pipevine chrysalis that was on Chris’ man-cave door had eclosed with a very fresh pipevine swallowtail butterfly. I was loading stuff into the car and noticed it was clinging to the chrysalis so I went in to grab…
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Another Trip Around the Sun
The last five weeks have been a whirlwind of go-go-go! We have been making up for our lack of going in 2020. We spent two weekends up in DFW, then Chris and I went to San Antonio solo, and then we picked Forest up from my parents who met us in Waco and then the three of us traveled down to Dripping Springs for my birthday weekend. Another trip around the sun! Last weekend Forest and I were home by ourselves as Chris was in Mississippi working so we were able to recuperate somewhat from all of that busyness. But two weekends away in AirBnBs were magnificent and the little…
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June 2021 Rewind
June blew by and July feels like it is on the precipice of doing the same. But the month started of with cuddles with the cats and has continued as the cats have gotten more used to us since moving into the house in April. Early in June, Forest’s school district had a reading event and book fair. It was a great way to kick off the summer and Forest was able to get a ton of books in some of the games they had plus the bookfair was buy one get one free! Lots of new books for a budding reader! In addition, he was very intrigued with the…
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The Garden in June (2021)
This month has felt very long and also incredibly short. It kicked off with this momma wolf spider out in the edible garden. I was trying to pull the pennywort that had taken over one of the perimeter beds when she scurried out with her babies. I quickly took some photos and let her be. And it wouldn’t be a spring season without a little too much water. After a rather soggy May and then a week of some heavier rain that lingered in early June, we had some minor flooding of the yard and pond fringe. Then of course, as per normal, we dried out and had nothing for…